The Abandoned Lullaby

RJ's Electrical Connections;
2011

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As shaky as his output was in the years since he first set hip hop orthodoxy aside, writing RJD2 off as a total loss seems premature. The Third Hand's dippy bedroom-popflopped in the way that only abrupt stylistic detours can, but when he honed that lite-funk sound on last year's decent-enough follow-up The Colossus, he seemed on his way toward actually taking it into appealing places. Factor in this year's oddball side project as the Insane Warrior, the 1980s horror soundtrack/electro-prog/library music pastiche We Are the Doorways, and he's already put out a couple of solid pieces of work in the last few years that retain his adventurous nature without letting the burden of his early rep stifle him. Maybe all he really needs to do is keep working out the kinks and find a way to let his beat-making chops translate more readily into traditional song arrangement.

Plus, teaming up with a pretty good vocalist wouldn't hurt. Enter Aaron Livingston, a singer originally out of Philly who flirted with fame via a guest spot on the Roots' "Guns Are Drawn" and showed up on The Colossus six years later to lend his talents to "Crumbs Off the Table". That went so well that Livingston and RJ recorded another dozen songs under the name Icebird, and if The Abandoned Lullaby is the best piece of evidence so far to justify RJD2 Mk. II, it's also a good showcase for an eccentric singer on the verge of reaching a wide, receptive audience. Both parties click together because they're willing to let genre be an afterthought, yet they still avoid succumbing to a rootless, stylistically overreaching identity crisis.

Identity crises being what they've been over RJD2's career, the fact that he's pulled together a number of familiar elements from his past repertoire is unsurprising but well-executed. Fans enamored with the rangy, all-things-1970s blowout Since We Last Spokewill find some good moments to grab on here-- there's still no gymnastic drum-break sample flipping, but RJ's geeky ear for cross-genre fusion pays off in a similarly satisfying way. The "Move on Up" vibe of "Just Love Me" and the minor-key, piano-driven skulk of "Please, Don't" are retro-funk 101, but their straightforwardness is driven by a marked flair for percussive arrangements that hit with more oomph than anything on his last two solo records. And his sense of ambition starts cresting on the album's dramatic, moody second half, where he indulges in the best instincts of his prog affinity to ends both icily ambient ("The Return of Tronson") and arena-rock heavy ("Gun for Hire").

Livingston, meanwhile, makes for a good foil to RJ's occasionally grandiose production. There are moments where he switches from a casually conversational way of singing into a full-on jolt of unadulterated joy or frustration with Swiss-watch timing. He works his raspy tenor well enough to make the moments where he drops flat, bum notes (like the quasi-Egyptian chorus in "King Tut") more of a jokey, self-aware idiosyncrasy than actual sandbagging. Best of all, he's got enough charisma to break out of pro-forma neo-soul roles: an optimist getting frustrated in the face of aggravating bullshit on "Going and Going. And Going", the desperately haunted lover on "Spirit Ache", the recidivist begging not to be led back into temptation on "Please, Don't". He doesn't have the show-stopping voice or the lyrical incisiveness of a Cee-Lo to justify the surface-level Gnarls Barkley comparisons The Abandoned Lullaby might rack up-- and RJ's not quite at the full command of a landmark signature sound like Danger Mouse was a couple of years back, either. But if there's been a better two-man indie-funk producer/singer superduo to come out of the woodwork since "Crazy" dropped, I must have missed it.